81 



TINDAL, REV. NICHOLAS. 



TINTORETTO, JACOPO. 



undermine its original." The book made a groat noise, and various 

 answers to it soon appeared, the most noted of which were Dr. 

 Water-land's 'Scripture Vindicated," 1730; 'The Usefulness, Truth, 

 and Excellency of the Christian Revelation defended,' by Mr. (afterwards 

 Dr.) James Foster (the eminent Dissenting clergyman), 1731; 'A 

 Defence of Revealed Religion,' by Dr. Conybeare (afterwards bishop ol 

 Bristol), 1732 ; and ' An Answer to Christianity as Old as the Creation,' 

 by the Rev. John (afterwards Dr.) Leland (another learned and distin- 

 guished Dissenting divine), 1733. The book is also discussed in the 

 last-mentioned writer's more celebrated work, his 'View of the Prin- 

 cipal Deistical Writers,' published in 1754. Tindal defended himsell 

 in ' Remarks on Scripture Vindicated, and some other late Writings,' 

 published along with a new edition of his ' Second Address to the 

 Inhabitants of London and Westminster,' in 1730. But this was his 

 last publication : his health now began to give way, and he expired on 

 the 10th of August 1733, at a lodging in Cold- bath Fields, to which 

 he had been prevailed upon to remove' a few days before from his 

 chambers in Gray's Inn. Tindal never held any preferment except 

 his fellowship ; but it is stated, in the ' Biographia Britaunica," that in 

 the reign of King William he frequently sat as judge in the Court of 

 Delegates, and had a pension of 200?. a year granted to him by the 

 crown for his services in that capacity. It is added that he " rarely, if 

 ever, practised as an advocate in the courts of civil or ecclesiastical 

 law," which would seem to imply that he had been called to the bar, 

 or been admitted an advocate of Doctors' Commons, although that 

 fact is not mentioned. A new edition of his ' Essay on the Law of 

 Nations' was published the year after his death ; but the publication 

 of a second part of his ' Christianity as Old as the Creation,' which he 

 left ready for the press, is said to have been prevented by the inter 

 ference of Bishop Gibson. A will, in which he left nearly all he had 

 to Eustace Budgell, in whose hands he was for some time before his 

 decease, was contested by his nephew, the Rev. Nicholas Tindal, and 

 was at last set aside. The will was printed in a pamphlet, with a 

 detail of circumstances connected with it, in 1733. 



Of the amount of talent and learning shown in Tindal's writings 

 very different estimates have been formed by his admirers and his 

 opponents. Waterland, in the Introduction to his ' Scripture Vindi- 

 cated,' characterises his antagonist in the following terms : " His 

 attacks are feeble, his artillery contemptible; he has no genius or taste 

 for literature, no acquaintance with the original languages, nor so 

 much as with common critics or commentators ; several of his 

 objections are pure English objections, such as affect only our trans- 

 lation : the rest are of the lowest and most trifling sort." Dr. Conyers 

 Middleton, on the other hand, in a letter which he addressed to Water- 

 land immediately after the latter had published bis book, says, "For 

 my own part, to observe our English proverb, and give the devil his 

 due, I cannot discover any such want of literature as you object to him; 

 but, on the contrary, see plainly that his work has been the result of 

 much study and reading; his materials collected from a great variety 

 of the best writers ; his pages decently crowded with citations ; and 

 his ind. x of authors as numerous as that of most books which have 

 lately appeared." Tindal's English style is unaffected and perspicuous. 



TINDAL, REV. NICHOLAS, was the son of a brother of Dr. 

 Matthew Tindal, and was born in 1687. Having studied at Exeter 

 College, Oxford, and taken his degree of M.A. in 1713, he was after- 

 wards elected a Fellow of Trinity College in that university. In 1722 

 he was presented by Lis college to the vicarage of Great Waltham in 

 Essex ; in 1738 Sir Charles Wager, then first lord of the admiralty, with 

 whom he appears to have some years before sailed for a short time as 

 chaplain, appointed him chaplain to Greenwich Hospital ; in 1740 he 

 is said to have been presented to the rectory of Colbourne in the Isle 

 of Wight, upon which he resigned Great Waltham ; and .very soon 

 after he appears to have obtained his last preferment, the rectory of 

 Alvei-stoke in Hampshire, from the bishop of Winchester (Hoadley). 

 He died at Greenwich Hospital on the 27th of June 1774. 



Mr. Tindal's first literary attempt was a work published in monthly 

 numbers in 1724, under the title of ' Antiquities, Sacred and Profane, 

 being a Dissertation on the excellency of the History of the Hebrews,' 

 &c., which is described as a translation from the French of Calmet. 

 This was followed by two numbers of a History of Essex, which was 

 then dropped. He then engaged in his most memorable undertaking, 

 the translation, from the French, of Rapin's ' History of England,' 

 which appeared in a succession of octavo volumes in 1726 and follow- 

 ing years, and was reprinted in two volumes folio in 1732. This 

 second edition was dedicated to Frederick, prince of Wales, who in 

 return presented the translator with a gold medal of the value of 

 forty guineas. In 1744 a Continuation of Rapin, by Tindal, began to 

 be published in weekly folio numbers, which was completed in two 

 volumes (commonly bound in three), in 1747, the history being 

 brought down to the end of the reign of George I. A second folio 

 edition of this Continuation appeared in 1751, and a third, in 21 vols. 

 8vo, in 1757, with the addition of the reign of George II. down to 

 that date. The translation and continuation of Rapin were very 

 successful speculations ; and the publishers, the Messrs. Knapton, of 

 Ludgate Street, evinced their gratitude by making Tindal a present of 

 200?. It is generally stated that he was assisted in both undertakings 

 by Mr. Philip Morant, to whom solely is attributed the Abridgment or 

 Summary of the History and Continuation given at the end of the 



BIOQ. DIV. VOL. vi. 



latter, and also printed in 3 vols. 8vo, in 1747; but it does not appear 

 upon what authority it is asserted by Coxe, in the Preface to his 

 'Memoirs of Sir Robert Walpole,' that the Continuation, though 

 published under the name of Tindal, " was principally written by 

 Dr. Birch." There is no hint of this in the very full and elaborate 

 Life of Birch, in the second edition of the ' Biographia Britannica, ' 

 which is stated to be compiled from his own papers and the communi- 

 cations of surviving relations and friends. " His papers," Coxe pro- 

 ceeds, "in the Museum and in the Hardwicke Collection, which I 

 have examined with scrupulous attention, and various other documents 

 which were submitted to his inspection, and to which I have had 

 access, prove great accuracy of research, judgment in selection, and 

 fidelity in narration. He derived considerable assistance from persons 

 of political eminence, particularly the late Lord Walpole, the late earl 

 of Hardwicko, and the Honourable Charles Yorke. The account of 

 the Partition Treaty was written by the late earl of Hardwicke. The 

 account of Lord Somers's argument in Barker's case was written by hia 

 great-nephew the late Mr. C. Yorke. I can also trace numerous com- 

 munications by Horace Walpole, though they cannot be so easily 

 specified. Birch was a stanch Whig, but his political opinions have 

 never led him to forget his duty as an historian. He has not garbled 

 or falsified debates, or mis-stated facts ; he has not wantonly traduced 

 characters, or acrimoniously reviled individuals because they espoused 

 the cause which he disapproved; but in his whole work, whether he 

 praises or blames, there is a manly integrity and candid temperance, 

 which must recommend him to the discerning reader." This is a 

 sufficiently just character of the Continuation of Rapin : but, although 

 in some parts the work has a claim to be considered as an original 

 authority, it is in the greater part not only a compilation, but a mere 

 transcription from preceding writers. The authors indeed frankly 

 state in their prefatory notice that they have not scrupled to copy 

 or imitate any part of the several authors they have made use of, 

 when conducive to the usefulness of the work, or where there was no 

 occasion to alter or abridge. The numerous documents inserted at 

 full length make the Continuation a convenient repeitory of authentic 

 information ; and the notes which accompany the translation of the 

 preceding part of the work add greatly to the value of the original 

 text. Tindal's other publications were the pamphlet relating to his 

 uncle's will, an abridgment of Spence's ' Polymetis,' under the title of 

 'A Guide to Classical Learning for Schools/ and a translation, from 

 the Latin, of Prince Cantemir's History of the Growth and Decay of 

 the Othman Empire, which appeared in a folio volume in 1734. 



TINTORETTO, JA'COPO, one of the most celebrated painters of 

 modern times, and one of the heads of the Venetian school, was the 

 son of a dyer (Tintore), * hence the agnomen of Tintoretto : his family 

 name was Robusti ; and he was born at Venice in 1512. He exhibited a 

 remarkable facility for drawing at a very early age, which induced his 

 parents to place him in the school of Titian. Ten days however after 

 young Tintoretto had entered the school of the great painter, he was 

 sent home again to his parents ; Titian's attention being attracted by 

 some very spirited drawings he saw in his studio, he inquired who did 

 them, and upon Tintoretto's acknowledging himself the author, - 

 Titian ordered one of his scholars to conduct the boy home. 



This remarkable rebuff in the career of the young painter seems to 

 have added vigour to his energies, and he commenced a course of 

 indefatigable application. He purchased some casts from the antique 

 and some from the models of Daniel da Volterra, from the statues of 

 Michel Angelo of Morning, Twilight, Night, and Day, at the tomb of 

 the Medici, in San Lorenzo at Florence, resolving to follow the style 

 of Michel Angelo in design, and to combine with it the colouring of 

 Titian, which intention he proclaimed to his visitors by the following 

 line, which he wrote upon the wall of his apartment : 



" II disegno di Michel Angelo, e '1 colorito di Tiziano." 



By day he copied pictures by Titian ; and by night he made draw- 

 ings upon coloured paper, with chalk, from his casts, lighted merely 

 by a candle ; by which means he acquired a taste for strong con- 

 trasts of light and shade, a peculiarity for which all his works are 

 conspicuous. To these studies he added the occasional study of the 

 living model and of anatomy ; and to attain a still greater mastery of 

 chiar'oscuro, he used to make models of figures in wax, and place them 

 in pasteboard cases, making apertures for the light as he required it : 

 he also suspended models and casts from the ceiling, for the purpose 

 of becoming familiar with various perspective views of the figure. In 

 addition to these studies, he is said to have received much gratuitous 

 assistance from Schiavone in colouring. Tintoretto's first picture 

 which attracted notice was one containing portraits of himself and his 

 brother, by candle-light, himself holding a cast in his hand, and his 

 brother playing the guitar. He exhibited this picture in public, and 

 shortly afterwards he exhibited a large historical piece upon the 

 Rialto, which gave him a rank amongst the great painters of Venice. 

 It would be impossible to enumerate all his works here ; they 

 amounted to many hundreds. One of his first great works in fresco 

 was a fagade in the Arsenal, which he painted in 1546, representing 

 Balshazzar's Feast and the Writing upon the Wall. Of his first oil 

 pictures, the following were most remarkable : The Tiburtine Sibyl, 

 for the church of Santa Anna ; the Last Supper, aiid the Washing of 

 the Disciples' Feet, for the church of Santa Marcola ; for San Severo, 



G 



