736 



DELACROIX 



denied miracles, the Trinity, and atonement by 

 Christ ; and they may fairly be taken as consti- 

 tuting one movement, though they by no means 

 formed one school or agreed in the details of their 

 teaching. Thus some believed and others rejected 

 the immortality of the soul and human free-will, 

 and they did not all teach the same doctrine as to 

 the relation of God to the universe, some being 

 almost pantheistic. They were not for the most 

 part accurate scholars, and were rather acute than 

 profound thinkers ; but though their influence on 

 English thought seemed for a time to be blotted 

 out, they contributed largely to the progress of 

 rationalism in Europe. The chief deists were Lord 

 Herbert of Cherbury, called the ' Father of Deisrn ' 

 (died 1648), Blount, Tindal, Woolston, Toland, 

 Lord Shaftesbury, Lord Bolingbroke, Collins, 

 Morgan, and Chubb (died 1746). See the separate 

 articles on these writers, also CHURCH HISTORY, 

 RELIGION, RATIONALISM ; Leland, View of the 

 Deistical Writers (1754); Lechler, Geschichte des 

 Englischen Deismus ( 1841 ) ; Hunt, Religious 

 Thought in England (1872); Leslie Stephen, His- 

 tory of English Thought in the Eighteenth Century 

 (1876). 



Dejazet, PAULINE VIRGINIE, a great French 

 actress, born at Paris, 30th August 1797. On the 

 stage before she was five years old, she grew up 

 playing children's and boys' roles with marvellous 

 precocity of intelligence and grace, but first awoke 

 to a sense of her real greatness in an engage- 

 ment at Lyons, where her playing of such parts as 

 were then known as soubrettes endeared her to 

 the citizens. In 1821 she began to play at the 

 Gymnase, but her greatest triumphs were won at 

 the Theatre du Palais-Royal, whither she betook 

 herse-lf in 1834. From 1844 to 1849 she played 

 at the Varietes, next at various Paris theatres, 

 in the provinces, and at London, till 1859, when 

 she undertook the management of the Folies- 

 Dramatiques. She left the boards in 1868, next 

 year received a pension of 2000 francs, and died 

 1st December 1875. See Lives by Lecomte ( 1866 

 and 1892) and Duval ( 1876). 



Dekker, THOMAS, dramatist, was born in 

 London about 1570. He was a very prolific writer, 

 but only a few of his plays were printed. In 1600 

 he published two comedies, The Shoemaker's 

 Holiday, or the Gentle Craft, and The Pleasant 

 Comedy of Old Fortunatus. The first of these 

 pieces is one of the pleasantest of old plays, 

 and the second abounds in poetry of rare beauty. 

 Dekker's next play was Satiromastix, or the untruss- 

 ing of the Humorous Poet (1602), in which Ben 

 Jonson was held up to ridicule. In Every Man out 

 of His Humour and Cynthia's Bevels Jonson -had 

 made some satirical reflections on Dekker ; and 

 in The Poetaster (1601) he had assailed Dekker 

 and Marston with bitter vehemence. Long 

 afterwards, in 1619, Jonson told Drummond of 

 Hawthornden that Dekker was a knave. Before 

 the quarrel Jonson and Dekker had worked in 

 harmony ; in 1599 .they wrote together two plays 

 (which have not come down), Page of Plymouth 

 and Robert the Second. In 1603 Dekker published 

 a pamphlet entitled The Wonderful Year, which 

 gives a heart-rending account of the sufferings 

 caused by the plague. To the same year belongs 

 the very amusing tract The Bachelor's Banquet, in 

 which he describes with gusto the ills to which 

 henpecked married men are forced to submit. His 

 most powerful writing is seen in The Honest Whore 

 (1604), of which the second part was published in 

 1630. Middleton assisted him in the first part. 

 In 1607 he published three plays written in con- 

 junction with Webster, the Famous History of Sir 

 Thomas Wyat (which has descended in a mutilated 



state), Westward Ho, and Northward Ho. A 

 pamphlet entitled The Bellman of London (1608) 

 gives a very lively account of the vagabonds of 

 London ; and Dekker pursued the subject further 

 in Lanthorn and Candlelight (1608). which passed 

 through several editions. The most famous of his 

 pamphlets is The Gull's Hornbook (1609), in which 

 the life of a town-gallant is racily depicted. The 

 Roaring Girl ( 1611 ) was partly written by Dekker : 

 but Middleton must take the' chief credit for that 

 excellent comedy. From 1613 to 1616 Dekker was 

 confined in the King's Bench prison. Earlier in his 

 career he had spent some time in the Counter 

 prison. In each case his debts were the cause of 

 his imprisonment. With Massinger he composed 

 the Virgin Martyr ; and Lamb was doubtless right 

 in ascribing to Dekker the most beautiful scene 

 ( II. i. ) in that play. The Sun's Darling, licensed 

 for the stage in 1624, but not printed until 1656, 

 was written in conjunction with Ford. A powerful 

 tragedy, The Witch of Edmonton ( posthumously 

 published in 1658), was written by Dekker, Ford, 

 and Rowley. We hear of Dekker m 1637, when he 

 republished his Lanthorn and Candlelight under 

 the title of English Villainies, and then he drops 

 out of notice. His plays were collected in 1873 

 (4vols. ); and his pamphlets, which afford much 

 valuable information about English social life in 

 the early 17th century, were republished in 5 vols. 

 in Dr Grosart's ' Huth Library. ' 



De la Beclie, SIR HENRY THOMAS, a well- 

 known geologist, was born near London in 1796. 

 He was educated at the military school at Great 

 Marlow, and entered the army in 1814. Three years 

 after, he became a Fellow of the Geological Society, 

 of which he was afterwards made secretary, and 

 eventually president in 1847. In 1820, while resid- 

 ing in Switzerland, he published a paper on the 

 temperature and depth of the lake of Geneva. In 

 1824 he visited Jamaica, and published a paper on 

 the geology of the island. Other works are a Manual 

 of Geology ( 1831 ), Researches in Theoretical Geology 

 ( 1834 ), and a Geological Observer ( 1853 ). He under- 

 took to form a geological map of England ; and soon 

 after he had begun, the government, sympathising 

 with his design, instituted the Geological Survey, 

 and placed him at its head. He was founder of the 

 Geological Museum in Jermyri Street, and of the 

 School of Mines. In 1848 he received the honour 

 of knighthood ; and in 1853 was elected a corre- 

 sponding member of the Academy of Sciences of 

 Paris. He died 13th April 1855. 



De la Borde, HENRY FRANCOIS, COUNT, a 

 French general, born at Dijon, 21st December 1764. 

 The son of a baker, he enlisted at the outbreak of 

 the Revolution, and by 1793 had risen to be general 

 of brigade. He distinguished himself in Spain at 

 the Bidassoa ( 1794), next commanded a division on 

 the Rhine under Moreau, was governor of Lisbon in 

 1807, and was ennobled in 1808. He declared for 

 the emperor on his return from Elba. He died 3d 

 February 1833. 



Delacroix, EUGENE, a French painter, chief 

 of the Romantic school, was born at Charenton- 

 Saint-Maurice, near Paris, 26th April 1799. At the 

 age of eighteen he entered the atelier of Pierre 

 Guerin, a follower of David, and came under the 

 far more powerful influence of his fellow-pupil, 

 Gericault. In 1822 he exhibited his first work, 

 'Dante and Virgil,' the novel force of which 

 attracted much attention and won the praise of 

 M. Thiers among others. In 1824, Delacroix, who 

 was now at the head of the new school of young 

 painters, produced the 'Massacre of Scio,' which 

 was entirely repainted after the artist had studied 

 a work of Constable's. The July revolution left its 

 impress on Delacroix, and in 1831 appeared his 



