243 



ST. JOHN, JAMES AUGUSTUS. 



ST. LEONARDS, BARON. 



244 



to Egypt. He was made a member of the Institute in 1807, and 

 appointed professor of anatomy and physiology in the facility of 

 sciences in 1809. He was sent by the government on a scientific 

 expedition to Portugal in 1808. In 1815 he was returned as a member 

 of the Chamber of Deputies for his native city of Etampes. He died 

 at Paris in July 1844. 



Geoffroy St-Hilaire was one of the most assiduous cultivators and 

 ablest expounders of what is called philosophical anatomy. The idea 

 on which this department of science was founded had been developed 

 in Germany, and successfully applied to zoology and comparative 

 anatomy during the latter part of the last century. It was however 

 amongst the rich collections of the Jardin des Plantes, and the activity 

 and zeal of such men as Cuvier, Lamarck, Temminck, Desmarest, 

 Valenciennes, Serres, and St.-Hilaire, that it received its most import- 

 ant applications and its greatest development. The fundamental idea 

 of this system is the unity of the composition of the various parts of 

 an organic body, and that this unity is capable of expression in a few 

 simple laws. What, in fact, might be predicated in botany of the 

 various parts of a plant by a knowledge of the structure of the leaf, 

 might, in the same way, be predicated of the structure of animals by 

 a knowledge of certain fundamental parts of their organisation. Thus 

 Geoffroy St.-Hilaire, amongst his other labours, established the fact 

 that the numerous bones of the head of the fish, and by consequence 

 those of the higher animals, were transformations of the simple ver- 

 tebra) ; and that the laws of development which applied to the one 

 applied to the other. 



These views equally applicable to every organ of the body, were 

 generally developed by St. Hilaire in a work published in 1818, 

 entitled 'Philosophic Anatomique,' which was illustrated with an 

 Atlas of folio plates. He also published several papers and essays 

 on the principles of philosophical anatomy. In 1828 a small work 

 appeared as an introduction to the lectures delivered on natural 

 history in the Jardin des Plantes on the principle of the unity of 

 organic composition, with the title, 'Sur le Principe de 1'Unitd de 

 Composition Organique,' 8vo. Although previous to the time of 

 Geoffroy the morphological idea lying at the basis of philosophical 

 anatomy had been applied to the explanation of the phenomena of 

 abnormal forms of animals, just as it had been of plants, yet the 

 subject had not been fully developed. In 1822 he published his great 

 work on the anatomical philosophy of human monsters. These beings, 

 which had formerly been regarded as mere unaccountable freaks of 

 nature, were now found to be the result of the action of fixed laws, 

 and their various forms susceptible of the strictest classification. 

 This work contained a new classification of monsters, with a descrip- 

 tion and comparison of their different forms, and a history of the 

 various causes supposed to produce them. It also comprehended some 

 new views on the nutrition of the foetus, and an accurate estimate of 

 the phenomena attending the development of the sexual organs in the 

 male and female foDtus, in which the author pointed out the fact of a 

 unity of composition in the reproductive apparatus of the two sexes 

 in birds and mammalia. 



A list of the papers which St.-Hilaire contributed to the various 

 departments of natural history would be very long. There is scarcely 

 a branch of zoology to which he did not successfully apply the great 

 principles of his anatomical philosophy ; and few indeed are the works 

 on natural history published diiriug the present century that do not 

 bear testimony to the great influence he has exerted. At the same 

 time the views held by the school, at the head of which Geoffroy St.- 

 Hilaire may be justly placed, have led to great controversy. Fully as 

 Cuvier was impressed with the importance of Geoffrey's works, he 

 opposed him in some of his conclusions, and this led to a controversy 

 which developed, in these inquiries, a theological element ; Geoffroy 

 St.-Hilaire opposed the doctrine of final causes, as being in opposition 

 to the theory of a unity of composition. In his philosophy he states 

 that he knows nothing of 'intentions' or 'objects' in creation; and 

 when Cuvier spoke of the part an animal " had to play " in nature, he 

 rejoined that there were no "animals which had a part to play in 

 nature." This controversy has since, in this country, assumed a 

 popular form ; and it is obvious, from the use made by the advocates 

 of the doctrine of final causes, of the principles of the ' Anatomical 

 Philosophy,' that this theory is not incompatible with their view?. 

 We may add that Owen and other great comparative anatomists of 

 the present day are strongly opposed to many of the conclusions of 

 M. Geoffroy St.-Hilaire. 



A complete edition of the works of Geoffroy St.-Hilaire has been 

 published in Franca under the title of 'Professional Studies of a 

 Naturalist,' in 42 volumes. Etienne Geoffroy St.-Hilaire left behind 

 him a son, Isidore, who has successfully cultivated the favourite 

 science of his father. A complete list of Etienne Geoffroy St.-Hilaire's 

 works will be found in Callisen's 'Medicinisches-Schriftsteller Lexicon.' 



ST. JOHN. [BOLINGBROKE.] 



* ST. JOHN, JAMES AUGUSTUS, was born in Caermarthen shire, 

 about the beginning, or a little before the commencement of the 

 present century. He was instructed in the village grammar-school, 

 where he distinguished himself by his early proficiency, and by his 

 efforts at self-culture, acquiring, in addition to the classics there taught, 

 a knowledge of the French, Italian, Spanish, Arabic, and Persian 

 languages. When only seventeen he came to London, and commenced 



writing for the press, an occupation he has since steadily followed. For 

 a while he was editor of a newspaper published at Plymouth in which 

 he advocated principles of freedom far in advance of those then in 

 fashion. His first work was ' Abdallah,' an oriental poem ; and soon 

 after returning to London, he became sub-editor of the ' Oriental 

 Herald,' then issued by Mr. James Silk Buckingham ; and for this he 

 wrote a history of the rise and progress of the British power in India. 

 In 1827, in conjunction with Mr. D. L. Richardson, he started the 

 ' Weekly Review,' in opposition to the ' Literary Gazette,' but it failed 

 of success. In 1829, he with his family, visited Normandy, and a 

 ' Residence in Normandy ' was the result, published in two volumes. 

 In 1830 he removed to Paris, where he wrote ' The Lives of Celebrated 

 Travellers,' for Colburn's ' National Library,' and published a col- 

 lection of his earlier essays under the title of 'The Anatomy of 

 Society.' In 1832 he went to Switzerland, where he left his wife and 

 family, and travelled over a great part of Egypt, visiting on his way 

 back Malta, Sicily, and Naples. On his return to England in 1834 

 he published the result of his travels in a work called ' Description of 

 Egypt and Nubia;' and in 1834-35 were published ' The Hindoos,' 

 in two volumes, for 'The Entertaining Library,' issued under the 

 superintendence of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge. 

 In 1835 he returned to France, taking up his abode at Chantilly, where 

 he prepared his work ' On the Manners and Customs of the Ancient 

 Greeks,' which however was not published till 1842, in three volumes. 

 In the latter part of his labours on this work he was afflicted with 

 blindness, and his son Bayle St. John acted as his amanuensis. He 

 has also written three novels, 'Tales of the Ramadban,' 'Margaret 

 Ravenscroft,' and ' Sir Cosmo Digby ; ' with other works, as ' Isis, an 

 Egyptian Pilgrimage,' ' There and Back Again,' ' The Nemesis of Power, 

 or Causes and Forms of Revolution,' ' Philosophy at the Foot of the 

 Cross,' with innumerable contributions to periodical works. He has 

 likewise edited the works of Locke, the proEe works of Milton, Sir 

 Thomas More's ' Utopia,' Sir Thomas Brown's ' Religio Medici,' and 

 Bunyan's '.Pilgrim's Progress.' Three of his sons, Bayle, Percy, and 

 Horace, have also attained some celebrity in the literary world. 



*ST. LEONARDS, EDWARD BURTENSHAW SUGDEN, 

 BARON, was born in London in 1781, devoted himself to the study of 

 the law, entered himself at Lincoln's Inn, and was called to the bar in 

 1807. But earlier than this he had manifested his eminent qualifica- 

 tions for the profession he had chosen by the publication, in 1805, of 

 1 A Concise and Practical Treatise of the Law of Vendors and Pur- 

 chasers of Estates." This work " was certainly the foundation of my 

 early success in life," as he himself states in a thirteenth edition, pub- 

 lished in 1857. It supplied a want, its value was recognised by all 

 professional men, fresh editions were repeatedly called for, and the 

 author took care, by improving upon each, to add to his reputation, 

 which also concurred to increase his practice as a conveyancer, to which 

 branch of his profession he at first confined himself. In 1808 he pub- 

 lished his ' Practical Treatise on Powers,' which has gone through 

 seven editions ; and which possesses great legal excellence, but like the 

 previous work, derives its character and its value from his knowledge 

 and exposition of laws, orders, precedents, and decisions, rather than 

 from any wide view of the equitable principles upon which they are 

 founded, or ought to be founded. Of a more popular character was 

 his next work, ' A Series of Letters to a Man of Property, on Sales, 

 Purchases, Mortgages, Leases, Settlements, and Devises of Estates,' a 

 small volume published in 1809, of which several editions have been 

 printed. The letters were intended as a practical guide to unpro- 

 fessional men, and were written so as to be intelligible to all, enabling 

 any one to judge how far he could depend upon his own ability in 

 managing his transactions, and where he should have recourse to pro- 

 fessional assistance. In 1811 he published 'The Law of Uses and 

 Trusts,' a posthumous work of Chief Baron Gilbert, the principal 

 value of which consists in the Introduction and Notes supplied by the 

 editor. The character of these various works had procured for him 

 an extremely large business as conveyancer and chamber counsel, 

 with frequent occasions for acting as counsel in the common 

 law courts, and he ceased to appear as an author, except in occa- 

 sional pamphlets upon legal subjects, and in preparing new editions 

 of his previous works. In 1817 he gave up his chamber practice 

 and confined himself to that of the chancery bar, where in a short 

 time his assistance was eagerly sought in all the most complicated 

 cases, and when in 1822 he was made king's counsel he obtained 

 the leading business in that court. In 1828 he entered Parliament 

 as member for Weymouth. He was not distinguished as a debater, 

 but his knowledge of law made him a valuable adherent, and in 

 1829 he was promoted to the office of solicitor-general and knighted 

 under the administration of the Duke of Wellington. His tenure 

 of office only lasted till the accession to office of Earl Grey and the 

 Whigs in 1831. In 1S35, during the short administration of Sir 

 Robert Peel, Sir Edwai-d Sugden was Lord Chancellor of Ireland. 

 Returning to England he took an active part in the House of 

 Commons -as member for Ripon, and on Sir Robert Peel's .accession 

 to office again in September 1841 he resumed the duties of 

 Lord Chancellor of Ireland, which he continued to perform with 

 general satisfaction till July 1846, when Lord John Russell suc- 

 ceeded Sir Robert Peel. During his release from professional duties, 

 he prepared a volume entitled ' A Treatise on the Law of Property, 



